


Like Fighting

by shinesurge



Category: Kidd Commander (Webcomic)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-10
Updated: 2019-08-10
Packaged: 2020-08-14 06:20:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20187697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shinesurge/pseuds/shinesurge
Summary: Phineas and Ulrich like to dance, did you know?





	Like Fighting

Phineas is getting sloppy. Sloppier, at any rate. Ulrich stacks his cards in hand and taps the sides of them to the table, his other hand propping up his head while he watches the creature he'd chosen to follow into Kairos Crossing tilt in her seat.

"I don remember what thehcars do" she mumbles after a long silence, squinting at her fistful of cards.

"They do not _do_ anything." Ulrich says, again. "They are just numbers. You're trying to make twenty-one." 

Phineas starts to laugh. Ulrich watches with something dangerously close to affection as the rest of their game drowns in cheap wine.

"Come on, Phin," the rest of Ulrich's admonishment is lost as Phineas decides this is _also_ the funniest thing she's ever heard; she pitches forward and buries her head under the tangle of her arms, her voice muffled by the table. With her emotions intensified like this Ulrich feels like he's been shoved into a lake full of them, his own bark of laughter is a surprise.

"Phin," he reaches for her wrist and gives her a little shake, giggling helplessly. "get it together, Kidd." She grabs his wrist right back, her hand of gorgeous antique cards scattering across the table dangerously close to the half-full mugs (her third, his first, mostly for show).

"Be careful!" Ulrich snaps. His spike of indignance is quickly replaced again by Phineas' warm aura, like sand rushing to fill a gap. She ignores his outburst and hauls him to his feet as she launches out of her seat, a short shock of command shushing harmlessly over his skin. She's giggling again and it's obnoxiously difficult to stay angry as she pulls him closer.

"Dance me," Phineas demands, tangling her fingers in Ulrich's hair and shaking her hips without rhythm. She's too close, makes him shiver; he patiently tugs her hands free and she twists them in his grip so they're clasped together now. She swings their joined hands childishly.

"Lucky Noon, love of my life," Phineas croons, tapping the excess energy from her toes. She's talking to Noon but looking directly at Ulrich, her face flushed pink and her eyes bright with the laser-focused intensity of one besotted and besotted. It's a lot of unfiltered Phineas, Ulrich would be squirming under normal circumstances but she's utterly contagious at this point; he nearly loves him too. He'll be annoyed with her when he's not buzzing with someone else's high. For now he follows her telegraphed movements as she sways them in a slow circle, mostly worried she's going to trip over herself if he lets go. "Noon, my shining star, would you play us a tune?"

"A little ditty?" Ulrich teases, twirling her. He can't help it; he never gets to dance anymore, and Phineas is surprisingly good at it considering her lack of any sort of formal training. She's wearing her coat around her waist and it flares out like he's spinning a ribbon, she makes an extra revolution on the ball of her foot before falling against his chest, grinning like she's walking out with the biggest prize at the ticket booth.

"A jig!" 

"Try again, mausbär."

She laughs again and Ulrich sees a flash of orange in his better eye that thrums all the way down to his toes.

"A spritely shanty!" 

"There you go, good enough."

"Don't drop her, operator." Noon drawls.

"I won't." he says.

Ulrich fits his hand in the small of Phineas' back and they glide across the floor. Something about vibrations and momentum, she'd explained some time ago. Commanding was almost dancing, and fighting too, and she and Ulrich had always been good at that hadn't they hahaha. Her hands have a very faint electrical buzz where they touch his skin, the same muted sense of energy as a plasma globe. She's like neon, he thinks, then immediately feels foolish and resolves to find an excuse to argue with her later.

There's a hum under the floorboards too. It gets louder, rises up tunelessly around them until it reorients itself with a heartbeat and a melody that itches in their toes.

Phineas lets him lead and keeps up with him easily despite her drunkenness, her feet hardly touching the floor. Fighting and dancing are basically the same, she remembers telling him, just a bunch of reactions you keep in your muscles until you need them, and Ulrich somehow knows exactly how to call his up to match hers perfectly. His smile is easy and Phineas loves the way he looks, loves that the tension in his face and shoulders has eased, wonders if he ever looked like this all the time. Mana stirs and a flash of possessiveness lumps in Phineas' throat. She hums over it right along with the melody Noon's fashioned for them, letting it spark and die in the air between herself and her lovely liar. The furniture considerately makes room for them when she _does_ stumble, and his hand appears around her waist in a recovery that nearly passes for a low dip. He holds her there for an extra beat like she's nothing (she's _wonderfully_ light), searching her face with a soft laugh. 

"Alright?" he asks. It takes every bit of willpower she has not to kiss him. Some bright part of her does reach out anyway, and the corner of Ulrich's mouth tugs upward.

"Don't you do it, your breath is making my eyes water." She giggles and he swings them up again. The light is dim now and the space outside their steps is darkened, warm and soft like that night in Decodenn after the arena; Phineas' aching joy over Agatha, blazing from her in her drunken haze, had soaked into Ulrich's bones like rain into cracked earth. It's so much easier to be close with the excuse of blaming it on something else, and knowing, in the infrasonic way Phineas makes him know things, that he doesn't have to do anything in return but exist and be near. 

And hold her up when her balance finally gives out. She pillows the side of her face on his chest, draping her arms around his neck and heaving a long sigh as their dance melts down into a slow motion that's more hips than feet. Ulrich settles his chin in her hair, links his hands behind her and closes his eyes.


End file.
